Rocky Mount, N.C. — The trustees of North Carolina Wesleyan College have named James A. Gray III as the college's sixth president.

Gray, who most recently was associate dean for external affairs at the Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, will assume leadership of the independent liberal arts college on June 1.

“We are delighted to have Jim Gray join us at Wesleyan. He has proven leadership and fundraising skills and has already generated enormous energy and enthusiasm among those who have met him," Vel Johnson, vice chairman of Wesleyan’s Board of Trustees and chairman of the presidential search committee, said in a statement.

Before moving to UNC, Gray was associate dean for marketing and communications at Duke University's Fuqua School of Business. He also previously served as president of U.S. operations for London-based Citigate Communications, president of public relations for Brouillard Communications in New York, the corporate division of J. Walter Thompson, and president of Manning, Selvage & Lee/U.S., the ninth-largest public relations agency in the world.

A UNC-Chapel Hill graduate and Morehead-Cain Scholar, Gray launched his career in communications in his native Winston-Salem before spending 20 years in communications and public relations management positions in Atlanta.

Wesleyan’s trustees selected Gray from more than 130 candidates from 32 states and two foreign countries.

He succeeds Interim President Stanley P. Caine, who has served Wesleyan since last summer, following the departure of former President Ian Newbould.